Circle 'substantially clears' backlog of USDC redemptions

Circle — the embattled operator of stablecoin USDC — claims to have "cleared substantially all of the backlog of minting and redemption requests for USDC."

The statement comes via an update on USDC operations, and claims that "since Monday morning, Circle has redeemed $3.8 billion USDC and minted $0.8 billion USDC."

The update follows Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire's recent sentiment that the crypto ecosystem needs to be protected from the banking system — not the other way around.

"Everybody's talking about how we need to save the banks from crypto and right now we're trying to save crypto from the banks," Allaire said in a recent interview with the hosts of the Bankless podcast.

After finding itself largely bankless in the U.S. after the high-profile collapses of Silvergate, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, Circle says it went live with a new transaction banking partner for both domestic wires and international wires. "We expect to bring more capabilities back online tomorrow," the team says.